good plain pork recipe with a prune placed at the end ... however inserting the prunes to each sausage is going to require some patience

The easiest way that I could think of doing this would be by hand using a funnel and having a measure/gauge to judge the lengths of the sausages by as you'll need two prunes at a time (apart from the first and last link)., so that when linked there will be one at each end. You are right as to the patience aspect, though I wouldn't expect that you'd make a lot of them at a time, though if you did you could always compromise and chop the prunes up and run the mix through a stuffer. The resulting mottled effect should be quite interesting.

kind regards

Parson Snows

Heavenly Father Bless us
And keep us all alive
There's ten around the table
And food enough for five... Amen

We have lots of similar things in Thailand, a couple that spring to mind are1) what would be called a bird's eye chilli in the UK in Thai is called "Prik kee Nu" which translates to "Rat Sh*t Chilli", somewhat logical if you think about the shape and2) there is one chilli; which I've never seen outside of Thailand; which unlike most chillies is very straight . This is called "Prik Noom" which translated is "Young Man Chilli"

kind regards

Parson Snows

you also wrote

Thanks for all the information you both write on here

Though I can't answer for fatman; my pleasure, I 'm glad that you find it useful.

Heavenly Father Bless us
And keep us all alive
There's ten around the table
And food enough for five... Amen

ceebee wrote:I keep pigs commercially although I don't seem to make much profit! I have 14 Gloucestershire Old Spot sows which produce an average of about 8 pigs weaned per litter and, if you get it right, each sow can produce 2.5 litters per year. In practice you will probably only manage 2 litters because you are late weaning or you miss the first heat. So each sow will produce about 16 weaners each year. Pig breeders using modern cross breeds such as Large White Landrace and Duroc would hope for more like 20 weaned pigs finished in 18-24 weeks but at high feed cost. My pigs live outdoors for much of their life and are fed a miserly amount of grain based ration because they go fat very easily and the modern trend is towards less fat. I do, however, have customers who want fat pigs and I do think that fat laid down over a long-ish period adds to the flavour. Our pigs will not finish (at about 80 kg liveweight) until they are about 30 weeks old so they have to command a premium in the market-place.

Pigs are relatively easy to keep. They will eat more or less anything that is not meat based ( they'll eat meat but you must not feed it to them for fear of disease) and they will clear an area of weeds better than any gardener. Old breeds like the Old spot, Tamworth or Berkshire are pretty hardy. They don't mind cold but wet gets them down after a while (like recently). Give them a nice shelter and plenty of straw and they are happy as larry. If your pigs are predominently pink they will also need sunshade and a wallow to cover themselves in mud which is their equivalent of sunscreen. Kept extensively disease is seldom a problem but you may find older pigs suffer from lameness and arthritis. In the UK you must register with DEFRA if you keep pigs and abide by the increasing number of rules and regulations that successive governments throw our way. In Somerset we are fairly well blessed with small abattoirs who will kill single pigs and, in some case, butcher them as well but if you are going into pig keeping check that you can get them killed locally. If you are breeding pigs don't forget that 1 sow at the start of the year may be 20 pigs by the end.

If you want to keep traditional breeds you can get information from the British Pig Association www.britishpigs.org or go and seek out a local pig farmer and pick his brains.

No pigs aren't violent, Tamworths are boisterous and noisy, but very friendly..I have heard of large amounts of pigs ganging up on a weak one but I thinbk this is more a product of thoughtless husbandry than bad tempered pigs...get em young and treat them well and they will reward you..